Anima
by Elven Star4
Summary: AAAAND it's 8! The Coliseum is not what you thought it was. Sephiroth, once the greatest general ever known, must come to grips with his mind. Can she save him? Is Alexiel ready to face her own problems? Woohoo for reviews! Keep it up! :)
1. Anima: Soulless Stained Glass

Anima  
  
'Some children died the other day;  
We fed machines and then we prayed,   
Puked up and down in modern fame   
...You should have seen the ratings that day.'   
'The Nobodies'   


Prolouge: Soulless Stained Glass

  


I cannot tell my story without going a very long way back.   
I would like to believe this is a story I'm telling. Part of me needs to believe it. I must believe it. That way I have a better chance. You see, if its all just a story I'm telling, then I have control over the the face in the mirror that is my own, control over the endings. I can be sure that there will be an ending, where the story ends and real life picks up where it left off.   
But it isn't a story I'm telling.   
I tell it in my head as I go along. I wasn't much for writing anyway. But I must be telling it to someone. You don't tell a story to yourself. There's always someone else. Even...when there is no one. Even when you are alone.   
I'll pretend you can hear me.   
But it's no good, because I know you can't.   
  


Five years ago

  
There's something cold and blank behind my smile today. Why shouldn't there be? All those years I'd worked in the barracks, in hopes of finally being assigned a regiment and a schedule, faithfully fulfilling Phil's every wish, and what do I get for it? Villianous and Heartless Supervision. Beating a bar against the cages of beasts.And the humans aren't any better; they can't be if they're here. My name is Alexiel, and I'm no damn psychologist. I honestly couldn't care less about what goes on inside the heads of those crazy bastards. As long as they're able to get out there and fight, what does it matter if they're a few waves short of a tide? This is the Coliseum, a step above prison, and a step below the army. It wasn't some nursing home; our fighters were here to, well, fight. No one questioned the motives of the fiends or the Heartless. Why are the rest any different?   
  
Most of all, what do they see in me? Why do they think I'll be able to crack these nutshells? I don't belong here; with these furtive, white-coated nurses who walk on eggshells through the endless whitewashed corridors. Nervous girls who never laughed, and burned me with psychological babble I never wanted to know. I was never one for this. This analysis, this speculation. A mouse can't damn well sneeze without someone here analyzing it. I'll admit I was always better at a man's job. I belonged outside with the fighters as they made their runs. That was the Coliseum. I belong with steel in my hand. I don't belong here, watching and waiting, analyzing men that are no better than Heartless, no better than apes.   
  
I hate this Wing, too, this entire building. It is white and there are no windows. And it is always silent, save when some soul starts their damn ranting and raving. The cells line the sideways. Solitary-that's in the back. Everything is spartan and clean. Nothing is there just to be there, everything has a purpose. There are no escapes, from the outside, or to yourself. No sharp edges. Nothing you can hang a rope from. No rope to begin with. Waste not, want not. If you're not being wasted, there's no way you can want. It's a beautiful October day. I wish I were outside.   
  
I finally reach my office. There are letters on the door that spell out my name, Alexiel Vangard, block, uniform letters that don't catch the eye. That would be dangerous. I open the door and let myself in. There is a chair, a desk, a fan and a rug. That was it. I sighed.   
Help me.  
  
There came a slight knock on my door. "Come in," I surrendered.   
It was McCoy, my new employer, as it were. "Hey Alexiel," he said by way of greeting. I nodded in reply.  
"Ah-" he continued, scratching at his thinning mop of brown hair, eyes darting nervously. "We, ah...have a patient in cell 113...he, uh...we might...need your help..."  
"That's fine, McCoy, thank you." I said sharply, rising to my feet. Hesitation isn't part of my nature. I gathered my things quickly; notepads, needles, things of that nature. No need for anything special. They're all the same. McCoy nods and shuffles out the door, walking the same way a lame animal might.   
  
Now came my part in this little opera. A chance to show you what it's like to be nailed to this wrecking ball.   
  


*** 

  
AN: Aw, nuts, I forgot the disclaimer! Well, anyways...I don't own anything here, or else I'd be disgustingly rich and have my own swimming pool full of those little sno-cap candies. Except for Alexiel. She's mine. 'The Nobodies' I share (along with a lot of wishful thinking ^_^) with Marilyn Manson. In the next chapter, Alexiel 'interviews' a patient with a startling resemblance to Cloud Strife. Revieeeeewwww! Love and Peace, Lady Aralondiel 


	2. Madness By Any Other Name

Chapter 1: By Any other Name

  
  
AN: My first review!! Thank you!! More chapters soon, I promise. As usual, I don't own anything here.   
  
He sort of looked like that fellow Cloud Strife, I mused, or he must have at one time. Same shock of blond hair, same cloudy blue eyes, although tinged and frayed at the corners with madness. But features that may have been handsome at one time were now shadowed and streaked with dirt and sweat, his hair ratted and mangled. The creature practically dripped with his ugly sin, and I couldn't help but curl my lip at it.   
  
And this one was a fighter, too- oh, how he struggled so against the guards, thrashing amd kicking like an animal and giving them merry hell indeed. Part of me nodded approvingly in spite of myself. He would do well in the Arena. People always liked to see desperation. People's cheers got louder when a man fought out of pure hatred, pure pain. He would bring in a good crowd. I lowered the needle. It wouldn't do to overdose him just yet.   
We needed money to rebuild that right wing, after all.   
  
I sipped my coffee, turning to Michele, my assistant. Her dark hair shook into her eyes as she shook her head. The young man's screaming was giving me the most dreadful headache, and I laughed as Michele rolled her eyes, sharing my sentiment.   
  
"Disgusting, isn't it?" she said mildly, over the howl and cry of the patient. "Did you see the new stone they placed over that crack in the Lobby?"   
  
"Let me go! Let me go, you sick bastards!!"   
  
"Oh yes, I did see that. Rather nice touch, you think?"   
  
"Please! Please let me out of here! Agghhhhhh-"   
  
"They ought to fix those pillars by the east entrance. They've been down forever."   
  
Another broken, sobbing cry was ripped from the throat of the patient. I huffed, stamping my foot and whirling on the two guards. "Just stick it with the damn needle already!" I cried. "Put some chains on that thing; we haven't got all day!"   
I put down my coffee, my forcibly bright mood utterly ruined. I turned my back as the guards did there work- and after the sound of a few well landed blows, the screaming had calmed enough for me to do my part. The guards- I forget their names- sat it in a chair. It still twitched and twisted convulsively from time to time, like a crooked pin. His eyes were glazed and unfocused, the drugs eating away at his brain.   
  
"He's all yours, Lexi." one guard calls, wiping his hands hurriedly on his pant leg. I sigh, and Michele shoots me one last sympathetic look look as I cross the boundary, and step into his cell. I sit across from the patient. It stinks of fear and drugs and I wish I could hold my nose. I take out a notepad and a pen calmly. I don't think I'll need it. Why should I? They're all the same anyway.   
  
Might as well look professional, after all.   
  
"Good morning, Charlie." I say.   
There is no answer.   
  
I clear my throat. "Good morning, Charlie," I try again, impatience and anger creeping into my thraot and twisting around my voice.   
There came a muffled reply, a whisper; the barest hint of a sound.   
"That is not my name."  
I sigh. "Of course it is. It always has been."  
"No." came the whisper.   
I peered beneath the shaggy mop of blond hair. His eyes stared into nothingness, right through me. They looked blurred, like mirrors that have been splashed with water. I recoiled.   
  
"I can never get out of here," he whimpered brokenly. "I can never get out, out out...they'll keep me here forever..."   
"It's for the best, Charlie." I say. "There won't be any more fires, then, will there?"   
  
The change is instantaneous, snakelike, startling. The clouded eyes sharpened to knives, his lips turned back in an animal snarl. His chair scraped as he lunged at me, so close I could feel his breath.  
"My name is not Charlie." he choked.   
  
Silence.  
  
I blink and sit back in my chair. I consider calling for the guards. I hated this far too much to stay.   
"All tied up and dried up forever...please, I have done nothing wrong..."  
"Now, now now Char- er, hmm. That's denial."   
"You're not even listening! How could you live- live like this?!" he gestured wildly to his surroundings.   
"Be calm!" I shout.   
"Be calm!? How can you say that to me! Tell me why I'm here! I'm innocent!"  
"You have been proven guilty!"  
"But I am not insane!"  
"Oh God, enough of this!" I cried out, slamming down my pen. "Backup!"   
  
Two guards rushed in, syringes at the ready. I didn't stay to watch. I practically flew out of that room. "I hate you," came a last, trademark response. Over and over again. I hate you. I hate you.   
  
I realized I didn't care.  
  
"Well?" asked McCoy.   
I sighed. "Nothing. How much are you gonna drug him?"  
  
McCoy raised an eyebrow. "Pardon?"   
  
I roll my eyes. I hadn't stuttered. My eyes met and challenged his, flint sparking off steel.   
"How much are you going to drug him?" I repeat impatiently. "I want him to be able to fight this Tuesday. He'll bring a good crowd." Crowds brought money.   
  
McCoy nodded and smiled sleazily with sudden understanding. "Yes." He said. 'He can fight."   
  
"Good." I said. I needed a bath in short order. "Keep him alive until then, will you?" I turned and began to walk away.   
  
Behind me, the cell door closed, with all the air and finality as the closing of a tomb.   
  
Now it was silent. Silent and white.   
  
Some man once said, "It is the people who make the law, the law enforced by the people, made justice by the people. Therefore, if a law is unjust, then it is still Justice, even if it is not just."   
  
They grind us down...  
  
I stare down at the empty notepad. I hadn't needed it after all.   
AN: Wooo! Sorry so long, folks. Next xhapter is shorter- but very important! Alexiel has a run in with a creepy, mysterious figure that could just change the way she looks at life. Review, please! Stick with me! Thanks again to those that have done so! 


	3. Child of Consequence

AN: First of all, I want to thank Aer_seph for my second shiny review.. ^_^ I've actually read a lot fo their work and it's great stuff! Go read it! WIthout further adeiu, chapter 2: Child of Consequence!   


Chapter 2: Child of Consequence

  
Finally I have a breather. I lay with my head down on my office desk, staring blankly at the myriad of monitors flashing ghost-like before my tired, blurry eyes. I am not really watching, I'll admit; rather just looking, black and white flickers of movement that go unregistered in my brain. Maybe that's why I hardly noticed when everything...stopped.   
  
Not gone black, mind you, or fizzed out,but actually stopped, like some children's game when someone shouts "Freeze!" and everybody does it. There on screen 12, McCoy hung permanantly suspended in time as he reached for his coffee. On screen 6, a diver splashed into a pool- and the thousands of tiny droplets of water hung in mid-air like glittering diamonds. A deathly silence, too, had come over the room, a silence so loud you can barely stand to listen.   
  
Reaching out, I tapped one of the screens.  
  
Nothing.  
  
I tapped harder now. I beat my palm against it. Rap, tap, bam.   
  
Still...nothing.  
The world hung, breathless and void, frozen in a single instant.   
  
Worthless piece of..." I mutter under my breath.   
  
But something moved- I saw it in the corner of my eye.   
I whirled around in my chair, and the look on my face must have been priceless, I assure you. My office was exactly the same as it was before. There's a desk, a fan, a chair. The door is locked. No one can get in here. (No one can get out...)   
  
But there was a boy.  
  
Small, yes, and dark skinned, although covered in loose, flowing purple robes that covered him and hid his eyes from me completely, so that I stared into empty blackness.   
What is this? Am I being shown something?  
  
"Who are you?" I demand. "How did you get here?"  
I glance back at the monitor screens. Everyone is still stone and unmoving, no life, no breath, like wooden dolls.   
  
And then the boy speaks, grinning hideously.   
  
He does not speak in words. His twisting mouth moves and forms silent syllables. No, I do not hear his voice with my ears. Rather it is crawling inside my skull. His arms and legs spin wildly, in some macabre dance as he speaks, like a marionnette.   
  
You are being shown something. We show you what you cannot see.   
  
"W-what are you?" I stammer. "What do you want from me?!"   
  
There is something vastly horrifying about this boy. I do not know what it is. I cannot put my finger on it.   
The boy cocked his head, the black hole that was his eyes staring emptily into mine. It twisted as it spoke again, dancing wraithlike in the air with wild, exaggerated movements.   
  
Do you ever listen to them?  
  
I furrow my brow. "Them who?" He points jerkily, and finally brings his finger to a rest. The screens. He's pointing at the screens.   
  
"Of course not," I answer. "They're crazy."   
  
I looked at him with a strange, crawling anticipation in my gut. The feeling was mixed with horror and an absurd urge to burst into hysterical and unsettling laughter. It made me feel like dancing and throwing up and the same time. The boy twisted and clapped. The silence had become very loud.   
  
Then the boy looked up at me, and I swear his face...changed.   
  
It was not the face of a boy, but a man. Silver hair flowed down his shoulders. Dragon-green eyes, tilted with madness, bored into mine. And then there was a light, a great and primordial light, crashing down on me like a hammer. A huge lancet of pain slipped into my head, cutting from temple to temple, dividing my mind like an orange. When I fell, I knew no more.  
  


***

"Phil?"   
  
"Yeah, whaddaya want?"   
  
"The new Supervisor...Alexiel? She goes to see Sephirtoh tomorrow, doesn't she?"   
  
"Oh yeah, she does. Wish her luck with that crazy bastard."   
AN: AAAAh! Sorry so long! I promise it won't happen again *sweatdrops* Next chapter- Alexiel meets Sephiroth! *grins maniacally* Watch for it soon! And review review review- did I mention review? 


	4. Coma White

Chapter 4: Coma White

  
AN: I promised Sephiroth. But you know what- this chapter will be waaay too long if I do. So what I'm gonna do is upload 3 & 4 at the same time so you can go right ahead. :) Sorry about the length with Alexiel, btw, I just want to lay her a firm foundation before I start rolling in the KH characters. ^_^ She is NOT, if you haven't noticed by now, a Mary Sue, and while Mary Sues take minimal time and effort to write, Alexiel is gonna need a bit of work. Any comments or suggestions are welcome, even flames! they're constructive too. Keep an eye out for Ansem, Seph, Sora, Riku, and all sorts of goodies in upcoming chappies.  


***

  
  
"To break down and cease all feeling,  
Burn now what once was breathing,  
Reach out and you may take my heart away  
Imperfect cry and scream in ecstasy  
But what befalls the flawless?"   
  
Aeris Gainsborough was almost never allowed in the Coliseum, for reasons that she never could understand. So she had jumped at the chance to finally see this place, this new world, and grinned. This wing, here, she understood, was some kind of place where they kept the fighters. But why was everything so white, so stark? It looked more like a prison or a looney bin than a barracks.   
  
Aeris laughed slightly in spite of herself, and frowned as the hall swallowed the sound completely. Dreadful place, she mused. Where is the arena? Her footsteps rang as she continued down the hall.   
A dead end.   
Aeris huffed, tossing her thick, auburn braid behind her shoulders. Really, what was the meaning of all this? She had followed the directions the small gruff goat-man...Phil, wasn't it? had given her, so there really shouldn't have been any problem.   
  
Aeris looked before her. A dead end, it was, where all hallways stopped, and at the very back, a thick, steel door.   
  
Well, maybe it's out that door. Doors don't just lead to nowhere, now do they?  
  
Smiling, she reached out one delicate hand, placing it on the thick, cold metal handle of the door.   
  
For a moment every thought in her mind dissapeared into a silent white explosion of revulsion and horror. Her skin turned to ice and her pale throat closed, and she jerked her hand back as though it were on fire.   
  
W-what?....What was that?   
  
The sound of approaching footsteps diverted Aeris's attention, and she turned, to see a tall woman in the white coat of a worker standing there, with light blond hair that falled just below her thin shoulders, and almond, piercing grey eyes on an aristocrat's angular, sculpted face. The woman smiled, but it seemed to Aeris that the smile was anything but friendly; not agressive or demeaning, but rather blank and weary.   
  
"Hello there." Aeris greeted nervously.   
  
"Hey, sweetheart. Did you lose your way?"   
  
Aeris sighed, melting with relief. "Oh, yes, I'm afraid so. It's my first time here you see. I'm trying to get out to the Arena."   
  
"What a coincidence. So am I." the stranger said bitterly, with a small, choking laugh. Aeris smlied nervously.   
  
"Go back down this hall and hang a left. Down the staircase and out the double doors on your right will take you to the Arena."   
  
"Thank you so much." Aeris gushed, and was about to turn and go. But that small bump of curiosity was screaming at her to ask, to know.   
  
"Pardon me, ma'am...What's behind this door?"   
  
The woman grinned sufferingly, saying through gritted teeth, "My next patient."   
  
"Oh." Aeris said, not expecting much more. "Thank you again...umm..."  
  
"Alexiel. No problem, don't mention it."   
  


***

  
  
A new patient. The weight of the world on my shoulders, I walk down the sterile corridor. I didn't get any sleep the night before- that boy haunted my dreams and my waking. His face is even now burned onto my retinas. I've gotta get a grip. I shake my head, hoping to at least shake the images, if not lose them completely. And as if that was not enough- I was told Solitary. Revered only for the finest of the insane and otherwise worthless. What was Phil thinking?!   
  
I had come early, and alone; Michelle and the others were probably not even up yet. The sun certainly wasn't. That suited me just fine; it matched my dark mood almost perfectly. I was the only one here at this unholy hour- or at least I thought I was. Hell, in Solitary, it could be any time of the day- it wouldn't matter. It would still be plagued by the same silence, the same abscence of noise that was even more pronounced than the rest of the building. It had thye untouched, fragile air or a museum or a graveyard.   
  
I see McCoy, then, walking in the other direction. He stops, and waves at me, and smiles. I smile back.   
What else can I do, really? I can't spit that far. And there's nothing here to throw.   
If I had something to throw, I might be able to hit him.   
But he's gone now. Another lost golden opportunity.   
  
You learn not to listen to opportunity anymore when you're here. You can't even look for it, there's no use, like a cat that crawls onto the page when you're trying to read. We lived...as usual. Everyone does, most of the time, anyway. What is the ususal? Whatever happens to be going on is the usual. Even this. We live, as usual, by ignoring.   
Ignoring isn't the same as ignorance, you have to work at it. We are a place apart from the world; nothing from the outside touches us. There were stories in the newspapers, but those paper stories were like dreams to us, dreams dreamt by others. Nothing could ever touch us in this cold, blank, white, silent prison. Not even ourselves. We muffled the dries from inside and out. The rest of the world was another, an unstable dimension.   
  
We were the people who were not in the papers. We lived in cold, blank, white, silent spaces at the edge of print.   
We lived in the gaps between the stories.  
  
I ought to feel hatred for this. I know I ought to, but I don't. What I feel is more complicated than that. It looks like freedom but it feels like death. I guess it's just somewhere in between.  
  
Help me.  
  


*

  
  
He was a General, they said. The greatest his world had ever known. The greatest warrior of ours. I knew his name, we all did. No one said it. His cell was the last one, in the very back. They brought him out to fight, nothing more. The risk was too great, they said. So why me? Why now?   
  
My hands shake as I touch the metal lock. Why am I afraid? I've crossed no boundaries, taken no risks, I've given no trust, all is safe. He's just another one of them, another Heartless, another crazy one. No different at all, I'm sure. And then a thought so alien, so completely unfamiliar entered my head. I suddenly wondered something I'd never wondered before.   
  
I wondred...how it must be strange. To have someone watching you all the time. Every inch, every flicker. To have them wonder- what is it going to do next? To be referred to as 'it' rather than 'he' or 'she'. To have people flinch when you move. I wonder...if this one is...He was a General once. A commander of men. Locked inside a cell no bigger than my bathroom until his hate consumed him.   
  
But he is an animal, the cold slap of reality entered. A Psycho and a madman. They all are or they wouldn't be here. They're not good for anything but the Arena.   
  
Still, it must be very hard, to be a man, like that.   
It must be just fine.   
It must be hell.   
  
It must be very silent.   
  
Trembling, I open the door.   
  
AN: Join us next time for Alexiel and Sephiroth! For real this time. *nudge* You're gonna wanna stick around- I don't think the meeting will turn out quite the way you expected....^_* 


	5. Sympathy for the Devil

Chapter 5: Sympathy For the Devil

  
  
_If I smile and don't believe  
Soon I know I'll wake from this dream  
Don't try to fix me I'm not broken  
Hello  
I am the lie living for you so you can hide  
Don't cry.  
  
Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping-   
Hello I'm still here  
All that's left of yesterday.  
  
_ -Evanecence, "Hello"   
I open the door.  
Now there's a space to be filled, a duty that I must preform, a time and a place, between here and now and then. The door is creaks and is heavy as if for an invalid. An invalid who has been invalidated. No exit. This was what happened, that day. It's going to be all right, I prayed. I said it in my head. Oh let it. Let him be just like the others. Let it be all right. Just this once and I would do anything. What I thought I do do for him or whoever was listening was of any use or even intrest I'll never know. Maybe the strange boy had some kind of plan for me. It seemed everyone had a plan for me except myself. As for me, I was only running. Running away, away.   
  
I don't want to be telling this story.   
  
I don't have to. I don't have to say anything. I don't have to tell anything, to myself, to anyone else. I could just keep running. But I'm so tired. I could just stop, then, peacefully. Just sit down here. I could withdraw. They could never get me out. Not as far down as I am. It's impossible. Why fight? That wil never do.  
  
The door is open. I must go through, or shut it forever.   
  
And I walked through. _ Just like so long ago..._  
  
Dragon green eyes.  
  
The same face that had flashed before.  
  
He didn't move, or react in any way to me being there. The darkness threw his lean, handsome face into shadow, but didn't mask those glowing eyes. I sit across from him in the tiny small cramped cell. I hope that the shock isn't too easy to read from my face. Part of me hopes any emotion is still able to show on my face. I remember I spoke first, trying to calm myself.  
  
"Sephiroth?"  
  
He nodded once, slowly, a fine silver brow arching as though I were an annoyance.   
  
"My name is Alexiel.."   
I shuddered. It was the first time I'd given my name to one of _them._  
  
I think I was surprised to see a human. People said he was a monster. He was not a monster. I needed perspective. I would find none here.   
  
"Sephiroth, I'm here to ask you a few questions. Would you mind?"   
  
He half-smirked and nodded, a strand of silver hair falling into his features.   
  
I lick my lips nervously, my mind racing for what I have to say. It is very difficult. I am here, in this moment, and it is not where I want to be. But that's where I am, and there's no escaping it. He smelled like leather and power. "Your world...was destroyed by the Heartless. Is that how you came?"  
  
Again that wolfish grin. "No. I was already dead."   
  
Whew. That's a relief. I know how to deal with crazy people.   
  
He must have guessed something of my thoughts, because he drew back, his eyes flashing emerald.   
He surprised me then. "You do not have the look of a psychiatrist," he said.   
  
"I have trouble remembering the way I look." I answered frankly. "And you're right- I'm not. I have no reason for being here."   
  
"Then why are you, in fact, here?"   
  
"Because I have no choice." The answer came as a shock to my ears. I remember a time when I had freedom. I remember a time where if anything in my life did not work out, it was because I had the wrong attitude. Everything that went on in life was thought to be due to some positive or negative thought inside your head. If you don't like it, change it, was what we said.   
  
Sephiroth smirked. "A pawn, then?"  
  
How dare he think he had the upper hand, here? "I ask the questions." I said flatly. But still it haunted my mind. It's strange to remember how i used to think, as if everything were available to us, no boundaries, free to shape and form as we would our lives. I was like that. I did that too.   
  
"Why-why are you here?" I asked weakly.   
  
He looked straight into my eyes. "It's good to be God." he replied.   
  
I wait for him to eleborate on this, but he doesn't. I am tired of theis Cheshire cat game. "What do you mean?" I ask.   
  
"You cannot cheat nature," he says. He is showing off to me. He is demonstrating his mastery of the world. He's breaking the rules and giving them the finger, getting away with it. To watch him is intoxicating. Perhaps he had reached that state where he felt he was indispensable and could do anything, anything at all. He was a General, after all. "Nature demands a certain variety. It stands to reason, it's part of the natural order of things. Order must have chaos, destruction is the only thing that can breed creation."   
  
"What are you trying to say?" I demand. "That being trapped like this is my _nature?!_"   
  
"Unless you conrol it. Unless you control nature." His voice lowers. "Unless you are chosen."   
  
"What are you getting at?" I ask.   
  
A flash, and his face is inches from mine. I feel his breath on my skin and my heart pounds in my chest. "They have offered me freedom," he says. "What have they offered you?"   
  
I hear a voice inside my head. Is it his? Is it my own?   
  
_Release me..._ I came up through the roar and confusion. I was like surf boiling. I can remember feeling quite calm. Calm, for a measure that would cost me my life. I felt like screaming. My scream only came out as a whisper.   
  
_"Yes."_ He smiled like rusted nails. He held out one hand The future in my hand. The future in his hand. The ancient gesture was both an offering and an invitation, to come forward, into the darkness. There was nothing in his gloved hand. It was empty. It might have been full of the future. I did not know. I could not see. I could not fight.   
  
"Let's get you out of here."  
  
I feel ridiculously happy.   
  


***

AN: Stays crunchy even in milk! *I'm SOOO sorry about being gone so long...*sweatdrops* I'm working on another fic as well. That doesn't mean updates won't come regularly though! Next chapter-Alexiel springs a madman from his cell and makes her escape into the free world. * 


	6. But Home is Nowhere

Chapter 6: ...But Home Is Nowhere   
  
  
I wipe my face on my sleeve.   
It is so like that day, that day ten years ago, when I remmebered the taste of freedom and choice, where the world was what I made of it. I can not remember the last time I cried like this. Tears are a luxury lost on one such as myself, and I do my best to hide them from this General madman, who watches me in the same way a fox must watch a rabbit. No doubt he thinks me weak. I am not weak. I wish I did not cry. I am supposedly a master of myself, every muscle, every vein. I can't even think of myself without seeing the skeleton. A cradle of life in bone and flesh, filled with toxins and sharp, jagged glass. Treacherous ground, my own territory. I was a fighter once. I used to think of myself as an instrument, a blade. A transportation. A gateway for my accomplishment. I could use it any way I wanted. There were limits, yes, but I was still single, still solid, still at one with myself. My heart pumped it's salty red ocean, keeping time.  
Now the flesh and bone is different. Now I am not solid. I am a cloud, twisted and congealed around my skeleton. My spine is so tight with fear that if I am startled I think I will snap. The fear tenses my muscles, taut as pulled bowstrings. Every step is an ordeal.   
  
You can't exist in the world if you have no place.  
  
I have no place in the world. I cannot exist. I feel thin, white, stretched. Afraid. I am dead, then, dead now as I was then, as dead as I was that day ten years ago.   
The day I died.   
  


***

_I am running with him, holding his hand, pulling, dragging him through the braken, he's only half-awake because of the drugs, so he can't cry out or say anything that might give us away, he doesn't know where he is. The ground is uneven, rocks, dead branches, the smell of damp earth, old leaves, he can't run fast enough. By myself I could run faster, I'm a good runner. I want to carry him but he would be too heavy. I have my boots on and I think, when we reach the water I'll have to take them off, will it be too cold, will he be able to swim that far, what about the current, we weren't expecting this. I think about drowning and I have to slow down. Then the shots come from behind us, loud not like cannons or firecrakers but like dead branches snapping. It sounds wrong. It sounds nothing the way you think it will. I hear a voice call. It says, "down." Is it a real voice or a voice inside my head or my own voice inside my own head or am I speaking out loud?   
I pull him to the ground and roll on top of him to cover him, shield him. Quiet, I say, my face is wet from sweat and tears and damp earth, I feel calm and floaty, my heart fit to burst inside my chest and as if I am no longer inside my body. Close to my eyes there's a leaf, red, turned early, and I can see every bright vein. It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. I ease off, I don't want to smother him, instead I curl around him, breathing him in, my hand over his mouth. There is breath and the pounding of my heart, the pounding of a door at a house at night, where you thought you would be safe. It's all right, I'm here, I say, whisper, please be quiet, but how can he? He's not well, it's too late, we come apart, my arms are held and I feel metal against my temple and then my vision goes dark like the wrong end of a telescope, small but very clear, they're taking him from me, please don't take him from me, I can see them going away, going away from me, he's holding out his hand, being carried away and I scream...It's my fault, it's all my fault...  
  
Ansem. I will never forget that name. You took him from me.   
  
And you may ask yourself, "Am I right? Am I wrong?' And you may tell yourself, "My God! What have I done?"  
  
_

***

  
  
"We cannot delay," Sephiroth said. I wipe my face on my sleeve and start running. The world has moved on. I will move with it.   
  
My feet make hardly any noise as I run through the whitewashed corridors. It's warm for this time of year. Around me the air is stagnant. A see a small razor laying on a table and I grab it as I run past.   
  
Just walk out the front door.   
  
And I am so close, so very close. There my freedom is, two doors not ten feet away. All I must do is walk through them and I am desperate, terrified.   
I push them open. They are heavy in my hands.   
I am outside.   
Sephiroth looks at me, then takes two steps in front, cautious. He has a sword. In my druk-like state, I hardly wondered just how the hell he had managed that. The sky is clear but hard to make out because of the searchlights. I can taste the night breeze, a wild thing in my mouth that tears at my lips and teeth. The moon is out and shines on me. A new moon, a wishing moon, a godess, a wink, a stone, full of deadly hardware and turning the shadow I sought against me, but oh God, how beautiful.   
  
"Alexiel?! What are you doing here?"   
  
I whirl around. It is McCoy. Sephiroth draws his sword, it hisses like a hungry snake as it leaves its sheath. But even he is not as fast as I that night. He was not as fast as I am free, and for that I am horrified to this day...  
  
The razor left my hands before I know it, burying itself into McCoy's fleshy throat.   
  
It took him what seemed forever to fall.   
  
The General looks at me curiously. I think I have surprised him.   
  
I have killed him.   
  
I am trembling. I feel like the sound of glass. I feel like the word _shatter._ And I do cry then, for the darkness in my heart, for my shock and horror, silent tears that slip down my cheeks. I have killed him. I have killed him. The reality punches my face again and again. In my ears I hear a howl- is God screaming at me? I am dammed and I am dead. My heart aches so much I could die.   
  
I walk over to the body. And I swear I looked into those eyes, permanently open, permanently closed to the world, still unseeing in horror. His eyes are burned out like flash bulbs. With every second, his face grows more and more twisted, more demonic, more grotesque. Where is that screaming coming from? I stare into the face longer and longer, although my mind screams for it to stop.   
  
We've all lost our place in the world, like kites with no strings or tails...   
  
This is it. I'm dammed. I'm running with the devil. I've sold my soul.   
  
And you may ask yourself, "Am I right? Am I wrong?' And you may tell yourself, "My God... What have I done..."  
  


***

  
  
AN: Wooo! Another chapter! And now- accepting anonymous reviews! C'mon people, I really do live off them. Thanks so much to those who have already jumped the gun on that one! Next chapter- Alexiel is free, but it came with a price she wasn't willing to pay. And even worse, her-+ partner in crime is having the _ worst _ time cooperating... 


	7. In the Shadow of the Valley of Death

AN: Hey guys! I just wanted to answer a review and thank a loyal reader of mine sooooo much for keeping up with Anima. Yes, the chapters have gotten a bit shorter lately, but it's actually because I was afraid they wouldn't be read if they were too long! *smacks head* Well, thanx so much for the good advice- I was having a bit of a problem seperating as well. Thank you so much for reading!   


Chapter 7: In the Shadow of the Valley of Death

  
  
_We were neurophobic and perfect,  
The day that we lost our souls  
Maybe if we weren't so human, but  
If we cry,   
We will rust.   
And I was a hand grenade that   
Never stopped exploding.   
You were automatic,   
And as hollow as the 'O' in God...  
_ -"Mechanical Animals"   
  
If I leave now I might get away.   
It is still night as we walk across the sandy, empty arena. The damp air above me is like a lid. Like earth. I wish it would rain. A massive thunderstorm, rolling black clouds, ear-splitting lightning. I could be afraid then, I could share my fear because it was one that affected us all. I'd be let in. Now I could not, even the slightest, reveal my horror to this stone-faced General, who continued as if nothing had happened. Perhaps to him nothing had happened. He was a killer of men. I was not, for all my practice. How can he stand straight, his cloak billowing out behind him like the wings of a bat, his head proud as God, green eyes stoic and mechanical in their unwavering intensity? What drove him to keep his neck stiff and back straight while my truth weighs on me as heavy as stone and bone-chillingly cold, the kind of cold that wraps its icy sinews around your muscles so that you feel you'll never be warm again? If it was raining, I could focus on the lightning, white jagged streaks of light above. I would not have to see that face, still with death, change and mutate over and over again. The only white I will see from the sky is of angels, then, pecking and tearing at my eyes, outraged at my sin.   
I feel buried.   
I want to be reassured. I want to be comforted, consoled, held eve, I want to be told that it wasn't my fault, that freedom was never free, even if it was a lie, I want _him_ here. I turn to the General...Sephiroth? And I open my mouth to speak, to say something, anything.   
  
I should have known better, than to trust my voice. It has always been the most fickle of my aquiantences, having fled me several times when I needed it the most. I was silent, then, making no noise.   
  
There is more than one kind of freedom. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom to and freedom given. Now I am being given freedom from.   
Don't underrate it.   
  
The world had moved on. I must move with it.   
  
Sephiroth is silent, still. These men, we've been told, are like war criminals. It's no excuse what they've done in the past was legal and expected at the time: their crimes were retroactive. I do not feel any different about them than I do towards the crazy ones. Didn't. Maybe I do now. I do feel a change. I'm supposed to feel scorn and hatred. That's not what I feel. What I feel towards him is blankness. What I feel I must not feel. What I feel is partly relief, because _he_ is not Sephiroth. He was not a General. Isn't.   
  
"Where now?" I ask, my voice tired.   
  
He looks at me strangely. One silver brow is arched. His face is illuminated by the moonlight and he looks devilishly handsome.   
  
"I am going to fulfill my duty to Mother." he said, quite simply, as though stating something unbelievably simple, like, the sky is blue, or; I don't understand what the hell you're saying.   
  
"Your...mother?" I ask, curious. He has a hypnotic voice. Rich, deep, and powerful. It is like the roll of distant thunder. I must be careful.  
  
"It is no concern of yours, human. You have no part in this game any longer. Know that you have released the death of your world."   
  
With that, he turned his back to me, and...  
  
It took me several moments to try to figure out just what he was up to. I swear by everything that's holy, it looked like he was trying to fly.   
Hm. Nothing was happening, though.   
  
I felt my lip turn to a sort of hollow grin. He whirled around, one hand on his blade, silver hair whipping like soft platinum wires. His eyes burned into mine fiercely. "What is...what is going on?!" he demanded, as though I knew anything.   
"What?" I said, the snide remark through my lips before I knew it. "Thought you'd just...up, up, and away?"   
  
His jaw set tightly, he stalked over to me, and perhaps I would have been afraid. I should have been afraid at the devil staring me in the eye as he was now. But hell, we were already well aquainted by now. So I was not.   
  
"I have always ben able to fly." He said, once again, matter-of-factly, as though the words coming out of his mouth weren't insane.   
"And so now...you just can't?" I said. "Gained too much weight?"   
  
The blade was out in a flash, far too fast for me to see it coming. I felt it's cool steel against my skin. "I can kill you now, worthless human. All those who stand in my way must be prepared to die. Do you not know who I am?"   
  
I must have been tired. I must have not been thinking. Because I swear to you, I reached up and moved the blade away. This maniac ape was no better than I was.   
  
"I make a point not too get to attatched to your kind. And you know what, I'd hate to put a black spot on my record." I took two staggering steps away. "What sort of name is Sephiroth, anyway? Sounds like some god damn slip of the tongue." I muttered under my breath.   
  
"I am the child of Jenova, the Chosen One to have rule over this Planet and all in vengence upon you traitorous puppets..."   
  
"You're not from this world, are you?"   
  
"No." Is he...amused? Impressed? His blade has lowered and there is an expression in his eyes I have not seen before and I can not make out. It makes me angry.   
  
"Well, we have one thing in common, then. I suppose you could fly in this other world?"   
  
"I could destroy you without so much as lifting a finger."   
  
"Then why haven't you done it already?"   
  
He is silent. After a moment he seems to mutter to himself under his breath. "I could...but now..it seems all connected...since the day I met Ansem..."  
  
"What did you say?!" I shout, my mind caught in silent explosion of white shock and horror. "Ansem? You know Ansem?"   
  
Again that expression. Only now it becomes calculating, cold, conniving. "You have met?"   
  
"That's where I'm going." I said. I hadn't realized it until now. "I have...business to finish with him."   
  
"Well now..." Sephiroth said, his voice dropping, eyes slanting, almost seductive. He tooka a few lazy, wolf-like strides towards me, until he was inches from my face. "It seems we do have much in common." God, he was practically purring. "I, too, must find this...Ansem."   
  
"What for?" I asked, suspicious.   
  
"I could ask the same of you."   
  
"None of your business."  
  
"I'm glad we reached this little consensus, aren't you?"   
  
"Whatever." I say, starting to walk. "I'm going to get a Ship."   
  
"What for?"   
  
"It's the only way to travel from world to world," I say, asking myself how the hell he didn't know. "They're parked outside these gates. Unless," I added with a smirk, "You can fly."   
  
He frowned, but turned and began to walk towards the World Gates.   
  
"Where...where do you think you are going?"   
  
"I thought you had made the descision to take me to Ansem."   
  
"_We_ didn't decide anything! What's in it for me?"   
  
He turned, his gaze piercing my own. Again that melodic, haunting voice. "As long as you're with me, I promise not to kill you." The smile that graces his handsome features is like a chain link fence and just as trecherous.   
  
This time I shudder.   
  
"Word of a lunatic. It's worthless." I mutter, but still I walk behind him, then leading, to the Gummi Ship that will take me away from this world. Traverse Town must be the first place to go.   
  
I take one last, lingering look behind me, at the silent, cold, white, sterile prison that has worn me to a thing transparent and numb. Now I am free. It looks like freedom, but it feels like death. I guess it's just something in between.   
  


***

  
  
_ I know I lost time.   
There must have been needles, pills, something like that. I couldn't have lost that much time without help. YOu have had a shock, they said.   
I come up through horrible noise, through roaring and confusion, and screaming, screaming until my lungs and throat were raw and I had nothing left and my screams came as whispers, like a ghost, "Where is he? What have you done with him?"   
He's in good hands, they say. With people who are fit. You are unfit.   
The show me a picture of myself and him. My face is a closed oval. My light hair is pulled back behind my head. This is a woman I do not know. That is not me.   
You've killed him, I said. She looked like an angel, solemn, compact, made of air.   
She was wearing a dress I'd never seen, white and down to the ground._   
  


***

  
  
"We're nearing Traverse Town now." he says, and I look out the tiny window. There it is.   
  
"Prepare for landing."   
  


***

  
  
AN Stole my baby daddy: *huffs* I hope that was good enough! See you all soon! Next chapter- Sephiroth runs into a face he did not expect at Traverse Town. Things just might get ugly. And ALexiel gets a lead into the past that drove her away. >REVIEW< as always, tell me how I'm doing, any comments, flames, random deep thoughts about your mother's brother's sister's cousin's roomate's bay's daddy's dog who lived down the block welcome! 


	8. Paper Airplanes Makeshift Wings

Chapter 8: Paper Airplanes (Makeshift Wings)

  
  
Night falls. Or has fallen. Why is it that night falls, instead of rising, like the dawn? Yet if you look east, really look, you can see the darkness rising, not falling; darkness lifting its claws up into the sky, up from the horizon, like a black sun that hangs below cloud cover. It's like someone has lit a huge fire and the smoke rises, a line of fire just below the horizon, brushfire or a burning city. Maybe night falls because it's heavy, weighty I mean, the darkness is heavy like a thick curtain pulled over the eyes. Wool blanket. I wish I could see better in the dark than I do. Sephiroth seems not to notice.   
  
Night has fallen, then. We parked our ship outside the borders of Traverse Town not a half an hour ago, and had already entered the city. No breeze, here. Everything is stone and wood and dirty golden light that pours from lamps placed periodically along the streets. I have a lot of adrenaline. We spend some time just walking the almost endless streets, my mind adjusting to the bustle and commotion of the town. Still, almost as one we keep to the shadows, to the back roads, the alleys. We wish to be left alone. A rat in a maze is free to go anywhere, after all, as long as it stays in the maze. That's what I feel like. A rat in a maze. Now I had my freedom- now what? The truth is, all my goals had been so mixed up in my mind that I no longer knew where to begin. Only Sephiroth was as stoic as ever, walking tight with his shoulders tense, as though expecting a knife through them at any moment.   
  
You know what I wish? I wish there were dandelions. Isn't that absurd? There's not a dandelion in sight here, all cobbled roads and packed streets. I long for one, just one, a weed defying its nature, rubbishly and insolently yellow as the sun. Cheerful and for everyone to enjoy, shining for everyone. Sephiroth doesn't seem to care much about this, either.   
  
Dammit, isn't that guy affected by _anything?_  
  
I am, though. I am tired.   
"Sephiroth... we need to find a place to rest." I say, more of a command than a request, although he still looks as though he can go like this forever. Perhaps he can. I cannot. He eyes me coldly, but finally gives a tiny nod to his head, and we head deeper into the shadows.   
  


***

  
  
It wasn't much, just a makeshift pocket of space between alleys that had a roof over its head and was filled with empty wooden crates and darkness.   
I have been trying in vain to get a fire going; it is cold, but finally content myself with the pile of glowing embers that stubbornly refuse to bend to my will. So I take Sephiroth's example and sit, leaning my back against one of the wooden crates. He has found one and leans aginst it with the grace of some large panther, all flowing lines and muscle. I have to admit I am glad he is here. I am afraid. I do not want to be alone. Is he afriad? He does not look it. I must emulate that then, I must look as though I am in control. I am not in control, I feel torn up and weak. But I must look it.   
  
All at once he shifts, leans forward. There is a sickening cruch and a popping sound like joints snapping, and then a burst of black feathers exploded from his back, a single, great black wing with feathers like ebony daggers jutting out of his left shoulderblade. He cries out once in pain, but it is over just as quickly as it has happened.   
  
"What- you have a...what are you?"   
  
He lifts one eyebrow. "I already told you. I am the child of Jenova. I am-"   
  
"Yeah yeah yeah, I know all that. How come you've never mentioned you had wings before?"  
  
"Wing." he corrects.   
  
"Did you used to have two? Have you always had wings? Oh...is that what you were talking about when you said you could fly?" The questions leave my mouth in a rush. I am transfixed.   
  
"Only the one. No. And no."   
  
"Does it...does it hurt when it...rips from your back like that?" I ask.   
  
It takes him a long time to answer. When he does, I can barely understand. "Every time."   
  
"How can you...fly without wings?" I ask, curious.   
  
"I tire of talking to you, human."   
  
"_Alexiel,_ thank you. And do you have anything better to do?" I am cranky. I underestimate that he may not feel so alone and afraid as I do. It was a risk, but it was one that paid off. I recieve a _hrmph_ and shrugged shoulders in reply.   
  
But I am tired of being alone, tired of this melodrama. I'm tired of keeping silent. There are two of us here. I barely knew anything about the lunatic I helped free sitting across from me. Wheteher this is my end, or a new beginning I cannot know. I have given myself to the hands of strangers, because it can't be helped.   
  
"You say... you knew Ansem?"   
  
He nods, dryly. "It was when I first met him that I became what I am now. I told you, I had died once before. Now, her voice does not whisper to me quite so loud as it used to, and much of what I once knew is lost."   
  
"Her?"   
  
"Jenova. I have explained this to you already."   
  
"But I still don't understand."   
  
"That does not surprise me."   
  
I sit up angrily, my mouth open with a sharp retort, before I see a trace of what could almost be humor in his emerald eyes. It is gone quickly, but it is enough to stop me. "Well, shall we work together then? Were both looking for Ansem. But, truth is, I still don't know who you are or if I can trust you. I mean, you're just...you're..."  
  
"A nutcase?" he says, leaning in towards me. His wing brushes the ground.   
I swallow, embarrased.   
"You should not always trust things you have always known just because you have always known them." he says, leaning back smugly. "You do not know the slightest thing about me or how I came to be."   
  
"Well? Start talking."   
  
"Ladies first, _Alexiel._"  
  
"No way." I said flatly.   
  
"Very well then." he says. "But I do believe you will slow me down."   
  
"Hey, who's got the ship?"   
  
His eyes tighten. "I can kill you and take it from you. That is of no concern to me."   
  
"Then what is of concern to you? I don't think you'll kill me," I say with caution, "Because you would have done it by now."   
  
"I am not without my reason." He reached out a hand. "Do we have a deal?" he once again smiles that rusted nail smile, barbed wire and wolfish pleasure.   
  
I reach out and shake it anyways, clasping his heavy, gloved hand. I'm dammed anyway. It's as good a reason as any.   
  
"Very good..." he purrs, leaning back and tenting his fingers. "Now then...anything you'd like to say about yourself?"   
  


***

Aeris Gainsborough had been enjoying her leisurely stroll to the house she and her friends shared in the Third District when she saw _him._  
  


***

  
  
AN: Ya know, I feel kinda bad when I see other stories that are no longer than mine or really I think better but they have like, 86 reviews. Kinda makes me wonder if my story's not good enough. So, loyal reader(s), if the case may be, review, tell me what you'd like to see! Does it need more action? Suspense? Does Alexiel need to stop being a highly contemplative female dog? Tell us! 


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